


you must first love yourself (second place isn't so bad)

by WattStalf



Series: cos your love's got the best of me (baby, you're making a fool of me) [34]
Category: Baccano!
Genre: Drabble, F/M, hey what up its a warning for these guys, idk what this is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-01
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-12 10:10:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7930696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WattStalf/pseuds/WattStalf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>...but, really, Lua's more of a featherweight, so to think that she'd still take that prize...</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	you must first love yourself (second place isn't so bad)

**Author's Note:**

> WAHT IS THIS I DO NOT KNOWlmao  
> im sorry  
> love is weird  
> and im i have no idea what im doing anymore

Ladd Russo loves himself. He does, he really does, and he always has, and he always will. Nothing can change that, and for most of his life, he doesn't know what it feels like to love someone more than himself. He _can_ care about others, and he does, even if those others are actually few and far between, but there isn't anyone that actually matters to him as much as himself. There isn't any guilt over his feelings, either; after all, why should there be?

He doesn't see much of a reason to trouble himself with feeling guilty about something that comes so naturally to him, and that's really how he is with everything. In fact, if there's one thing that  _isn't_ natural to him, it's guilt, and he really hates the feeling and won't waste his time on it when it comes to something as basic as his own self-centered impulses.

He loves more than just himself, and he's always been capable of loving more than just himself, he just doesn't love those things  _more than he loves himself_ , that's all it is, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's still love and he still knows how to  _care_ , he just also knows how to  _prioritize_ , and that doesn't change the  _basis_ of his feelings. Love is love is love and caring is caring is caring, so it doesn't  _matter_ if he happens to always, always, always put himself first.

Until he doesn't anymore.

Until he's very, very, very surprised to realize that he doesn't love himself most of all anymore, that even though he loves himself as much as he always has, that there's something that seems just a little bit more important, and that when Lua stole his heart without even  _trying_ , she stole it  _for good_ , and she stole his own place in it, knocking him down a whole notch. Is it his first true defeat? He isn't sure, because he still feels like he's won something, feeling her delicate, fragile,  _vulnerable_ hand clinging to his arm, not looking for  _protection_ , or just looking for protection from everything but him.

Everything shifts when he realizes how  _much_ he loves her. His goals, his plans, his fun, his purpose, everything, and it shifts until it fits around  _her_ and  _her goals_ , and plans and fun, and her purpose is the only thing that changes for him, because she says that she never really felt that she had one before. Everything shifts and he isn't the only one at the center of it all anymore, and he isn't the one taking first place or the light heavyweight championship anymore (but, really, Lua's more of a featherweight, so to think that she'd still take that prize...)

Oh, he loves her more than anything and she means more to him than anything, and he's loved before and he's cared about things before, but he's never known what it feels like to look ahead and see someone else. It's always been him, he's always been first, and he wants to be mad that he's let her do this to him and he wants to wonder what she has that he doesn't have- except he already knows and he adores every part of her- but all he can do is grin until his goddamn face hurts, because the most surprising thing about loving somebody more than himself is how fucking  _nice_ it feels, how absolutely  _great_ it is. 

It's  _wonderful_ to have somebody mean this much and to have a direct purpose with that somebody and to know where he's going, and to know that it ends with the life draining out of her face and the last light in her eyes meant solely for him, and to know that this was what she wanted, this was what they  _both_ wanted. He  _loves_ her and he  _loves to love_ her, and loving himself second most isn't really that much less anyway.

 


End file.
